'Clockwork Orange' in New York: A brutal, exciting ballet of mayhem

Anthony Burgess' iconic 1962 novel A Clockwork Orange concerns a dystopian society terrorized by thugs, teenage "droogs" specializing in  "ultraviolence."  The book is also about language; Burgess created "Nadsat," an argot compounded of rhythmic Renaissance English, Russian, and contemporary speech, which, compounded by extreme British accents, makes this show difficult but also interesting and worth the effort; it makes "no appy polly loggies to thee or thine."

The book yielded another iconic work: Stanley Kubrick's 1971 film of the same name (remember Malcolm MacDowell's chilling wink at the end?), in which the cinematic mayhem created much controversy.

The legacy continues with this exciting import from London now playing off-Broadway at New World Stages. Using Burgess' own script (he wrote plays, music, and linguistic studies of James Joyce, besides novels), director Alexandra Spencer-Jones has made the story vividly her own, a production that began with her U.K.-based Action to the Word theater company.

Jonno Davies, a thrilling new Alex deLarge, starred in the London production and leads an all-male cast of 10 sculpted musclemen, each in multiple role changes signaled by lightning-quick additions of a skirt or a hat.  Much of the stage time is a brutal ballet, with the muggings and gang wars and rapes are choreographed to stunning effect: action is very clearly suited to the word.  Standouts among the impressive cast are Timothy Sekk and Sean Patrick Higgins.

The plot pivots on the issue of free choice, an issue that has vexed humanity since before the Bible. When Alex is caught and sent to prison, he is offered the option of a quick release, and he agrees to be cured of his violent impulses —more or less agreeing to be cured of his humanity and turned into a machine, a clockwork. He is subjected to an experimental conditioning technique whereby he is forced to watch horrifying acts of cruelty while listening to his favorite music by "Ludwig von," a "convenient heightener of emotion." It works. Music has been weaponized.

The dark lighting (James Baggaley) makes the stage an eternal nighttime, and the black and white costumes (Jennifer A. Jacob) emphasize the stark either/or choices. Most effective is the sound design (Emma Wilk), but the dialect coach (Stephen Gabis) may have overdone the authenticity for American audiences.

The play gives us all the usual suspects to blame: pitiless parents, mad scientists, mindless police, earnest clergy, and a passive society where people will "sell themselves for a quieter life." But it refuses to draw easy parallels to the current world: We are left on our "oddy knocky" to make meaning.

A Clockwork Orange. Through Jan. 6 at New World Stages, 340 W. 50^th St., New York.